Public Safety Blotter: April 22April 7 At 7:52 a.m., a caller reported a disturbance on Rezanof Drive West. It was a verbal argument only. At 10:37 a.m., a caller reported shoplifting on Mill Bay Road. It’s under investigation. At 11:39 a.m., a caller reported drinking in public on West Marine Way. There were no open containers when police arrived. At 1:53 p.m., police warned a person on West Marine Way for parking more than 12 inches from the ...

Alaska State Troopers: April 22April 13 At 2:30 p.m., a local airline agent reported that a Kodiak woman was possibly taking drugs to Old Harbor. Alaska State Troopers seized her baggage that had been left behind when she left and found methamphetamine and marijuana in the luggage. On April 17, the airline informed the troopers the woman had returned to the airport. The troopers arrested her for misconduct involving a controlled substance in th...

GETTING CLOSER TO HER DREAM: Bitanga becomes Kodiak’s first Gates Millennium scholar Deborah Bitanga trembled as she tried to check the mailbox during the weekend. Bitanga was nervous and emotional, so the 18-year-old Kodiak High School student told her younger brother, Rafael, to do it instead. “I was scared of a rejection envelope,” Bitanga said. Then her mom cried. “She cried like somebody died,” Bitanga said. But she said her mother was shedding tears of joy: An envelope addressed to Deborah B...

ON THE MARK: Schools converge for archery tournament“Are you guys ready to make history?” Russ Scotter asked an eager bunch of students armed with bows half their size. Moments later the first arrow hissed through the air and thudded into the target five meters away. History was officially made and a smile gleamed from Scotter. That smile remained on Scotter for the next three hours as he watched 24 students from five Kodiak schools compete in the first Kodiak Isla...

Many beds left at community gardenLast fall and late summer, volunteers spent hours screwing boards together into beds, stapling landscape fabric to the bottom of the beds and filling the beds with dirt. Now, the first season of using the new community garden located off Larch Street is about to begin. So far, just eight beds have been reserved out of the 24 in the garden by individuals, the local 4-H and local church, said Blythe Brown, a project...

Assembly forwards boat, mobile home tax changesThe Kodiak Island Borough assembly moved forward the elimination of the personal property tax on boats and changes to how mobile home are levied. At a recent work session, borough assessor Bill Roberts told the assembly that the tax on boats, $1 per foot, doesn’t bring in enough money to cover the cost of assessing and collecting the tax, which was originally assessed to keep boats from having to pay a different t...

Jerry L. BurnsLong-time Alaska resident Jerry L. Burns, 68, passed away at home on March 6, 2015, following a five-year battle with cancer. Jerry was born in Pomeroy, Ohio, on Jan. 27, 1947, and grew up in West Virginia near Mason and the Big Bend country and was proud to be called a “hillbilly.” He joined the U.S. Navy at 17 and served three tours in country in Vietnam between 1965 and 1978. While serving with the Navy Seabees...

Outdoor Kodiak: Jig, mooch for kings without downriggersI’m among the legions who love king salmon, both on the line and on the table. I’ve fished for them for over 50 years now, and they continue to fascinate me. In recent years downriggers have become standard equipment for saltwater fishing. They certainly make it easier to catch kings when they’re holding deep, but do you really need them? They’re expensive, after all, and if you’re not trolling at the moment, they...